“About 250 feet in advance of his line on the left the 13th Vermont had thrown up a breastwork on a low rocky knoll which was covered with bushes and trees. The 14th Vermont held a similar position to the left of the 13th, but on lower ground.” >More

The Gettysburg Bibliophile

In his introduction to Virtual Gettysburg, guide and collector Gary Kross states, "There are over 5,000 books, pamphlets and articles about the Battle of Gettysburg. Even if you could find it all, even if you could afford it all, you couldn't live long enough to read it all." That's the bad news. The good news is that the pace of Gettysburg scholarship and publication has never been faster.

In the years directly following the Battle of Gettysburg, the nation was too busy licking its wounds and grappling with reconstruction to think about writing or reading about the war. There were exceptions, but for the most part people wanted to think of other things. With the approach of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the battle, however, that all changed.

Interestingly, most of the first writings about the battle, specifically, and the war, generally, took place in the form of magazine articles. In the eighteen-eighties it became common place for surviving veterans to refight the Civil War with pen and paper. Century Magazine published an incredible run of fascinating articles between 1884 and 1887 which was later re-released as the multi-volume Battles and Leaders of the Civil War.

James Longstreet did a lot to hurt his reputation
during this period, both in Century Magazine and in
the Southern Historical Society Papers - fifty-two volumes
of equally fascinating post-war literary battles.
Robert E. Lee was dead and many Southern veterans
seemed intent on blaming the loss at Gettysburg on
Lee's 'Old Warhorse'. Longstreet, a better general
than a writer, fumbled against his detractors and
made the fatal error of pointing his finger at Lee.

Perhaps the most enduring legacy of the late eighteen-hundreds is the
deluge of books published by the Northern states. These volumes contain
monument photographs, dedication speeches, and regimental
histories. The first-hand accounts of the veterans, speaking
on the ground that they fought for, are both informative
and heart rendering. One can only imagine the loss
to history due to the fact that a similar record, filled with a greater sense of reconciliation
than most other writings, doesn't
exist by Southern veterans.

By the turn of the century, Gettysburg memoirs were becoming popular, perhaps nearly as popular as cheap wedding invitations are today. Lee never wrote about the battle,
but the Southern perspective was well represented
by John Bell Hood's Advance and Retreat,
Longstreet's From Manassas to Appomattox,
and John B. Gordon's Reminiscences of the Civil
War. A Northern officer, Lt. Frank Haskell of
the 6th Wisconsin Infantry, wrote a 175-paragraph
letter to his brother after the battle which has become
one of the most popular and oft-quoted accounts from either side.

The fiftieth anniversary of the battle brought a
huge increase in the published offerings for the general
tourist. Tipton, Blocher, and Mumper released picture
books with small monument photographs and simple narratives.
There were also histories written
by battlefield guides and veterans such as Long, Storrick,
Minnigh, and Gilbert.

The next big push to publish came with the one-hundredth
anniversary of the battle. Though hundreds of personal
accounts were republished and many general interest
picture books were repackaged, a new generation
of writers were trying their hand at explaining this
seminal monument in American history. Glenn Tucker's High Tide at Gettysburg and Bruce Catton's Glory Road were thrilling accounts of the
campaign from a Northern perspective. Death of
a Nation by Clifford Dowdey billed itself as
"the story of the Confederate role in the battle"
and a "searching examination of the reasons for
the ultimate defeat of the Army of Northern Virginia".

In the years following, two of the most important
books on the battle were released. Killer Angels by Michael Shaara is easily the widest read account
of the battle. Fictional, but based on history, the
novel tells the story of Robert E. Lee, James Longstreet, and Joshua Chamberlain
in a personal and accessable way that had never been
accomplished before. The movie Gettysburg is based on this book.

What Killer Angels did for the general reader,
Edwin Coddington's Gettysburg: A Study In Command did for the serious historian. Coddington's account of the
battle is an incredible mix of readability and depth,
and is considered by many serious students of Gettysburg
to be their favorite book on the battle.

In 1982, Richard Sauers released his book, The
Gettysburg Campaign, June 3 - August 1, 1863: A Comprehensive,
Selectively Annotated Bibliography, a listing
of almost three thousand titles. Until that time, a large portion
of the most important Gettysburg books were about
the entire battle, many including an overview of the
month-long campaign leading up to the fight. But
that would soon change.

The era of the micro-history was under way. Old ideas
about the battle were being dissected and debunked,
and new aspects of minutia were being being expanded
into published works and research projects.
Boutique publishers such as Morningside
Bookshop and Thomas
Publications began releasing works by a new generation
of intelligent, curious authors.

This trend has continued and widened into the 21st
Century. All these years after the battle one might
think that there is little new to say. But with diaries
coming to light almost daily and with emerging technologies
such as the Internet easing access to existing data,
there may yet be more to say about the three days
in July, 1863, when hell rained down on a small Pennsylvania
town.

GettysburgBook Update

Stephen Recker on:

Reading Gettysburg
The first book I ever read about the battle of Gettysburg was Coddington's "Gettysburg Campaign". To this day it remains my favorite book on the battle. That may be, in part, because it was my first. But the truth is that I really like how Coddington explains decisions that were made within the context of the limited options available to the commanders. I've never been in the military so all of this was new to me.>Read Entire Story